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, JEFFERSON DAVIS 

The President of the Confederate States 

AND 

ABRAHAM LINCOLN 



The President of the United States 

1861-1865 



— BY — 



Mildred Lewis Rutherford 

Athens, Ga. 

State Historian Georgia Division, U. D. C. 



"Be just and fear not. 
Let all thou aimest at be the truth." 



1916 






''The time has come when men may speak freely, kindly, 
and truly of the past. The War Between the States, with its 
sacrifices, has ceased, and peace between the sections with its 
ennobling, refining and uplifting influences, has come to abide 
forever. They who would stay its marches and delay its reign 
are the etiemies of the Nation's happiness." 

Bennett H. Young, U. C. V., 

Louisville, Ky. 

INTRODUCTION 

Mothers and teachers are urging the Historian General to 
suggest histories for the true Hfe of Jefferson Davis and of Abra- 
ham Lincoln, saying that the children in the schools today are 
getting distorted facts concerning both and when urged to write 
essays about these two men cannot find the right kind of refer- 
ence books at home or in the school and public libraries. 

Complaints are coming that the teachers in our schools, 
many of them men and women of Southern birth, are teaching 
that Abraham Lincoln was "a greater man, a man of more 
exalted purpose than was Jefferson Davis, and that the cause for 
which Davis stood was an unworthy cause." 

They make a plea that something shall be done and done 
quickly to meet the needs of the hour. 

In the cause of TRUTH, then, these sketches are prepared 
with the hope of undoing much of the evil already done, and with 
the hope of presenting these two leaders in a simple, truthful 
way so that they may be known and appreciated by even the 
youngest child in our schools. 

Many things not needful to know or discuss, because chil- 
dren cannot understand them, have been omitted, and only 
salient facts presented. That young people maybe interested, 
anecdotes of childhood, as far as possible, have been collected, 
also the public life and services of the two men to the United 
States Government have been stressed on account of Essay 
Contest U. D. C. -^ 5 6 -^i j. '^- - 



THE PRESIDENT OF THE CONFEDERATE STATES 



JEFFERSON DAVIS. 
Born June 3, 1808. Died Dec. 6, 1889. 

Three Davis brothers left their homes in Wales and came to 
America and settled in Philadelphia. Evan Davis came to 
Georgia and married a widow, Mrs. Emory, with two sons. By 
this marriage there was an only child named Samuel. 

The Revolutionary War was in progress when Samuel 
reached the age of fifteen, and his mother sent him very often 
over the line into South Carolina to take food and clothing to 
his half-brothers serving in the American Army. The young 
boy became so infatuated with army life that he begged to be 
allowed to join his brothers in camp, and was permitted later 
to raise a company of infantry and, young as he was, he was 
made captain. 

He led this company to Savannah and gained honors for 
himself in rendering aid to the Americans against the British. 
When the War ended and he returned to his home he found his 
mother had died, the home a wreck, all buildings burned, fences 
and crops destroyed. He then moved near Augusta, Ga., and 
began life as a farmer. 

When a soldier in South Carolina he had stopped one day 
on a march to ask for food at the home of pretty Jane Cook, 
and he never forgot the charms of that young hostess. 

As soon as the War ended and he had a home of his own he 
returned to ask her to be his wife. She was Scotch-Irish, and he 
was Welsh, so no better blood could be united. He was hand- 
some with a well developed body and a very active mind; she 
was very beautiful, intelligent and full of life. 

The home life was happy and congenial, and many children 
came into the home nest. Samuel Davis found it now much 
harder to provide for many than few, so he left his Georgia 
farm to seek life in the new State of Kentucky, because it gave 
better promise of a living for his family. 

He settled in Christian County, now known as Todd Coun- 
ty, and where Fairview is today was the modest home of Samuel 
Davis. He planted tobacco and began to raise fine-blooded 
horses and succeeded admirably well. 

It was at this Kentucky home that Jefferson Davis, the 

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youngest of ten children, five boys and five girls, was born June 
3, 1808. The names of the boys were Joseph E., who became a 
lawyer, and lived at "Hurricane Plantation"; Benjamin, a physi- 
cian, beloved and pious; Samuel and Isaac, both planters; and 
Jefferson, the youngest child. The names of the girls were 
Anne, Lucinda, Amanda and Mary, called Polly. 

For some reason the family moved later to Bayou Teche, 
Louisiana, but this place proved unhealthy, and another move 
became necessary, so a farm was bought near Woodville, Missis- 
sippi. The sport was fine for the Davis boys. They shot bear, 
deer, wild game of all kinds, and found fish to be abundant there. 

The near-by school was kept in a log cabin, and the teacher 
knew little beyond "the three R's — readin', 'ritin' and 'rithme- 
tic." This was Jefferson Davis' first school, going at the early 
age of five with his sister Polly, only two years older. The two 
little children had to go every day through a lonely wood, 
carrying the little dinner basket between them. One day a 
noise in the bushes made Polly believe the "old drunken chair- 
mender" was after them, and she was trembling from fright. 
Little Jefferson, with brotherly pride, while his little body also 
trembled, said, "We must'nt run, Polly. Don't be afraid, I'll 
protect you." 

It was not the chair-mender after all, but a great wild deer 
with branching horns, that gazed at the children for a few mo- 
ments, then bounded away and was lost in the forest. 

Little things sometimes lead to great resolves. Little 
Jefferson overheard two of his sisters talking one day. Amanda 
said, "Jeff is so little he'll never amount to a thing in this world." 
Polly said, "Yes, he is little, but he is such a dear boy." Jef- 
ferson then and there determined to learn how to wrestle so 
that he would grow big and do something worthy of Polly's 
love. 

The War of 1812 was on and three of the brothers joined 
Andrew Jackson's army. The other brothers took care of the 
home affairs and, realizing that Jefferson could get no education 
worth while at such a school, begged that he be sent to St. 
Thomas, a Roman Catholic school somewhere UrJ Kentucky. 
They were obliged to slip him away from his rnother for she 
could not abide the thought of separation from h^r baby boy. 

There were no stage coaches, no railroads and no steamboats 
to take him in that direction, so he had to go on horseback. 
This, however, was no hardship for, as soon almost as he could 
walk, he had learned to ride horseback — as all Southern^ boys ii 



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did. Major Hinds was taking his son Howell to the same school, 
so together the two little boys rode side by side for several weeks, 
camping at night or stopping at Indian "Stands" as they were 

called. 

Jefferson was the youngest boy in the school, but the Domin- 
ican priests were very kind to him, and one of them took him 
into his own room and into his own bed. There were mischiev- 
ous boys in this school, as there are in all schools, so these boys 
planned a trick on this priest, because they did not like him, 
and persuaded little Jefferson to blow out the light so that they 
could enter the priest's room in darkness. The trick was suc- 
cessful and the priest felt that Jefferson must know who the 
boys were, and attempted to force him to tell on them. Jef- 
ferson would not do it, even when carried to the loft and strapped 
to a frame to be whipped in order to force confession. "If 
you will tell," said the priest, "I will not punish you." "I know 
one thing," said Jefferson, "I know who it was that blew out 
the Hght." "Tell me that then," said the priest, "and you shall 
not be punished." "It was I," and the little fellow said this so 
boldly that it amused the priest, and he unstrapped him and 
let him go unwhipped. 

He stayed at school two years, and grew very much and 
looked very different from the slender lad of seven, for he was 
taller and stronger every way. His father then decided that he 
should be put at Jefferson Academy near home, so sent for him 
to return. Little Jefferson determined to play a joke upon his 
mother, by pretending that he was a stranger. He approached 
the house and seeing her standing in the doorway he called to 
her in a very careless way, "Good morning, Madam, have you 
seen any stray horses around here?" His mother looked at 
him closely, then recognizing him, folded him in her arms and 
said, "No — no stray horses but I see a little stray boy." She 
was so glad to see him, and when this greeting was over, he 
bounded off to the fields to find his father. 

When spring time came, Jefferson had the spring fever— or 
rather "school fever," so common to growing children^and said 
he didn't want to go to school. "All right," said his father, 
"every one about this place must work either with the hands 
or with the head. I need some hands on the farm, so I will give 
you some work to do." The next day he went into the field with 
the negro hands. It was so hot and he became so tired that he 
decided to go back to school, to study harder and to complain 
less. 



At twelve years of age, he entered Transylvania College, 
Ky. Here, "he was considered the brightest and most intelli- 
gent of all the boys as well as the bravest and handsomest." 
He was always noted for respect to his professors, and his teach- 
ers all acknowledged that Jefferson Davis was "the most polite 
boy in college." While "brimful of buoyant spirit" he was no 
violator of rules, and was at all times gentle and refined. 

His next move was to West Point to receive his military 
training. His father had died while he was at Transylvania 
College, and he grieved greatly over his death, and never even 
in after life could read one of his father's letters without being 
choked with sobs. 

The discipline at West Point was very rigid, but there he 
distinguished himself "for his manly bearing and high-toned, 
lofty character." He was not very studious, however, for, out 
of a class of thirty-three, he stood twenty-third, and yet he was 
the only one of his class whose name has come down in history 
as famous. He saved every month part of the money paid him 
for expenses and sent this money to his mother. 

It was at West Point he studied Rawle's "View of the Consti- 
tution," which taught him that if a State seceded — showing 
that it was an acknowledged fact by the Constitution that a 
State had the right to secede — the duty of a soldier reverted to 
his State — hence Davis, Robert E. Lee, Thomas J. Jackson, 
the Johnstons and others, acting upon this instruction, cast their 
lot with their States in 1861. Thus it happened then when in 
1865 the question of a trial of Jefferson Davis -was agitated, 
Chief-Justice Chase said that a trial would condemn the North, 
and so no trial was ever held. He was released on bail but his 
political disabilities were never removed. 

Jefferson Davis was only twenty years of age when he was 
graduated from West Point. When the Black Hawk War was 
threatening volunteers offered their services, and then it was that 
Captain Abraham Lincoln of Springfield, 111., came to be must- 
ered into service by Lieut. Jefferson Davis of the United States 
army. Little did either dream that their lives would clash so 
strongly in after years. This is the only record that these men 
ever met or were brought in personal contact with each other. 
Both made good soldiers, but only Davis attained any distinc- 
tion. Black Hawk surrendered rather than be captured by 
him, and became very fond of the young officer. 

The red chieftain knew a soldier when he saw him, and 
he was irresistibly drawn to this frank, bold and magnetic young 

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soldier, Jefferson Davis advised him to go home and advise 
the braves to divide their land with th^ whites — they could help 
them, and they could both dwell in peace together — -this 
would be better than to be driven into the sea. Black Hawk 
seized Davis' hand, gave it a cordial grasp, and marched away 
without a word. He told his men what Davis had said and 
counseled them never again to raise their hand against the men 
in blue. 

The War with Mexico followed, and then Jefferson Davis 
became a hero many times. At Monterey he distinguished 
himself; at Buena Vista he was wounded; and he scaled the walls 
at the City of Mexico. 

After his return his State sent him to the United States 
Senate. Later he was given a place in Pres. Pierce's Cabinet, 
as Secretary of War. When Buchanan was elected, Mississippi 
sent him again as United States Senator. 

The dark cloud of war was gathering and Abraham Lincoln 
was elected by the Republican Party on a minority vote, be- 
cause of the split in the Democratic Party, the Republicans 
standing, not for the abolition of slavery, but against forming new 
slave states out of newly acquired territory, fearing the growing 
political power of the South. 

Dr. Battle, of Charlottesville, Va., said, "Had the doctrine 
contained in that series of seven resolutions formulated and 
introduced into the United States Senate in the late fifties by 
Jefferson Davis been observed in good faith, there would have 
been no war." 

The South saw that their State rights were again so threat- 
ened that they could never hope for those rights guaranteed 
them, not only by the United States Constitution, but those 
also granted by the Declaration of 1776, so State by State be- 
gan to secede. 

South Carolina was first to act and Mississippi followed 
next. Jefferson Davis, although a strong Union man, had made 
a wonderful speech on State Sovereignty in the U. S. Senate 
and showed how the continued aggressions upon the rights of 
Sovereign States would finally force secession; so when he learned 
that his own State had seceded, he immediately resigned his seat 
in the Senate and returned to cast in his lot with Mississippi as 
he had been taught to do at West Point. 

As soon as he reached home he was made Major General of 
the army, an honor he had always craved. Therefore it was 
with extreme regret that he heard of his nomination for President 

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of the Southern Confederacy. He reaUzed he was unfitted for 
that ofiftce, that a military life would be far better for him and 
more according to his own desires, but duty to his country forced 
him to yield his ambition in this matter. 

Two sons of Kentucky thus became leaders in the most 
gigantic struggle that mankind had up to this timeever witnessed. 
These men were born near to each other in the same State, and 
there was only a few months difference in their ages. Strange 
to say neither now lies buried in his own native State. Davis' 
grave is in Richmond, Virginia, and Lincoln's is in Springfield 
Illinois. 

Gen. Bennett Young said in a speech made at Fairview, 
Davis' birthplace: "Jefferson Davis, misjudged in life, dis- 
franchised until death, is finding his true place in history. He 
bore the crown of sorrow and persecution and humiliation be- 
cause of his steadfastness, his loyalty, and his devotion to the 
people he loved. Twenty years have passed since he died, and 
the limelight of history has only brightened every spot in his 
pure, unsullied life." 

|i He had his enemies, and some were among his own people. 
Pollard, a Southern historian, has possibly more maligned him 
than any writer. North or South. Davis' imagined injustice to 
Jos. E. Johnston, his friend, may account for this. Many of his 
own Cabinet and Members of Congress disagreed with him in 
regard to his policy and accused him of being autocratic and 
partial. 

In private letters to his wife, never intended to be made 
public. Gen. T. R. R. Cobb gives some glimpse of the opposition 
President Davis had to endure. 

"Richmond, Jan. 12, 1862." 

"Stephens is openly opposing the administration and trying 
to^build up an opposition party." 

This shows the attitude of the Vice-President to him. 

Again: 

"Richmond, March 16, 1862. 

"Davis vetoed the bill making a Commanding General 
yesterday on Constitutional grounds, and it raised a perfect 
storm in Congress. I heard that the House of Representatives 
were debating the propriety of deposing him." 

Again: "Jan. 24, 1862. 

"Mr. Davis has lost his power in Congress, but Howell 
[his brother Howell Cobb], Toombs and I have agreed that, 
while in private we may boldly condemn his errors, we will in 



public generously uphold him when he is right. HE IS OUR 
REPRESENTATIVE. Stephens, on the contrary, is trying 
to create factious opposition to everything." 

Then others testified that "Gov. Vance, of North Carolina, 
and Gov. Brown, of Georgia, though patriotic men, are hamper- 
ing the Confederate Executive to a degree never before toler- 
ated." 

So President Davis had no easy task to guide the Confed- 
eracy through its four years of fiery trial. 

"Prejudice and passion have sought in vain to drag down 
his honored name in the dust to make it a synonym of shame in 
the eyes of every beholder. The more his memory has been 
defamed the more distinctly has the true nobility of his character 
been revealed. 

"The gentleness, the force and strength of his character; 
his superiority to adversity; his superiority e^^en to prosperity; 
his candor; his truthfulness; his fine sense of loyalty; his devotion 
to his country; his love for the Union; his unyielding adherence 
to principle; his clean honesty, alike in private and public life; 
his freedom from malice; the simplicity and purity of his life; 
his Christian charity — these are the things which made Jefferson 
Davis great, the memory of which the world will not willingly 
let die." {Editorial from the Times Democrat, New Orleans, 
June 3, 1903.) 

After he had done all that was possible to do, he sent com- 
missioners of peace to the Hampton Roads Conference, and when 
that mission was a failure, and terms only of unconditional sur- 
render offered, after hearing of Lee's surrender, he left Rich- 
mond to go to Texas to do what could be done with the Trans- 
Mississippi Army. He was captured at Irwinville, Ga., and kept 
in Fortress Monroe as a prisoner for two years. He was 
not captured in woman's dress — that is one of the myths 
oi history. As the Government dared not try him he was re- 
leased on bond, and after travel abroad he returned first to his 
Mississippi home, then went to Memphis, Tenn., to enter in- 
surance w^ork, for which he had no taste, and for which he was not 
fitted. Then he moved to Beauvoir to spend his remaining years, 
unjustly deprived of citizenship by a Government under whose 
flag he had won such renown. 

Summing up his character it will be found that Jefferson 
Davis was a GENTLEMAN, a SCHOLAR, a STATESMAN, 
an ORATOR, a SOLDIER, a PATRIOT, a HUMANITARI- 
AN a kind SLAVEHOLDER, a PHILANTHROPIST, and 

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/ 



a CHRISTIAN — a man that may safely be held before the youth 
of the land for emulation. 

As a gentleman: — 

He was ever gracious, ever courtly, always 
refined ; he was a devoted husband, a loving, tender 
father, a just, kind and humane master. 

As a scholar: — 

His public speeches were gems of literary excel- 
lence and polish. His messages as President of the 
Confederacy show the same excellence of diction, 
and his "Rise and Fall of the Confederacy" 
testify the same. 

As a statesman: — 

His record in the United States Senate, as 
Secretary of War in President Pierce's Cabinet 
and as President of the Confederate States is not 
questioned in statesmanlike qualities. 

We think of Jefferson Davis as a warrior under Gen. Zachary 
Taylor in the Mexican War, and as a Senator in the United States 
Congress, and as President of the Confederate States, but no- 
where did his genius display itself more signally than as Secretary 
of War under Franklin Pierce. 

It was he who first formulated a scheme of building a railway 
across the continent, also for acquisition of the Panama canal 
zone and the purchase of Cuba, and the opening of Japan and 
China to American trade, and for close commercial relations 
with South America. 

Under him the army was enlarged, improved guns were 
introduced, young officers sent off on various surveying expedi- 
tions for better training. He sent young George B. McClellan 
as a special representative of the War Department to study the 
movements of the British and Russian armies in Crimea. R. E. 
Lee, his boyhood friend, was made superintendent of the West 
Point Academy, and he advanced Albert Sidney Johnston to 
important commands. He had camels brought from Arabia to 
transport military stores across the Western deserts. He 
planned large things for the nation. 

He revised the Army Regulations, showing a thorough 
knowledge of the subject and a masterful grasp of the needs of 
our army, as well as the armies of Europe. 

10 



That he beUeved in preparedness is shown by the fact that 
he insisted upon the addition of four regiments to the army and 
organized a cavalry service pecuHarly adapted to the wants of 
the country; introduced light infantry, or the rifle system of 
tactics.and caused the manufacture of rifles, muskets and pistols. 
He gave such valuable suggestions to workmen at Colt's Armory 
that they made him a pistol on the silver breech of which they 
engraved the words: "To a brother inventor." 

Through his influence numberless forts were repaired and 
rehabilitated, the frontier defences strengthened, and the west- 
ern part of the continent explored for scientific, geographical 
and railroad purposes. It is with pride we look back upon his 
work in the Coast Survey question, for he was recognized as 
the ablest and best posted defender in this work. Under the 
supervision of the War Department, during the first year of Mr. 
Davis' service, the extension of the new Capitol was energetically 
prosecuted. He stood by General Meigs in all his efforts to 
construct the waterworks, finish the Capitol building on the 
grandest scale, and to push forward the extension of the Treasury 
Department. A splendid stone aqueduct, which spans 220 feet, 
a few miles from Washington, built during Mr. Davis' term as 
Secretary of War, still remains a monument to his earnest labor 
for the benefit of the capital. It is known as "Cabin John Bridge." 

During the War Between the States his name, cut in solid 
granite blocks, was, by the order of either Secretary of War 
Stanton or Secretary of Interior Caleb B. Smith, erased. Through 
the efforts of the Confederate Memorial Association — especially 
Mrs. Behan and Mrs. Enders Robinson, nobly assisted by Mrs. 
Cornelia Branch Stone, of Galveston — U. D. C. President-Gen- 
eral — that name was replaced. 

As an orator: — 

His speech at Fanueil Hall, Boston, 1858, was 
a masterly effort in defence of the South and the 
Constitutional right of slavery. When it was 
known that he was to make his Farewell Ad- 
dress to the Senate in 1861, the House of Repre- 
sentatives came in a body to hear him. 

As a soldier: — 

No other testimony is needed beyond his 
record in the Mexican War. 



11 



A tribute from one of the North who served with Davis in 
the War with Mexico is: 

"Fellow-citizens: I was at Buena Vista. I saw the battle 
lost and victory in the grasp of the brutal and accursed foe. I 
saw the favorite son of 'Harry of the West,' my colonel, weltering 
in his blood as he died on the field. I saw death or captivity 
worse than death in store for every Kentuckian on that gory 
day. Everything seemed lost and was hopeless when a Missis- 
sippi regiment with Jefferson Davis at its head appeared on the 
scene. I see him now as he was then — the incarnation of battle, 
the avatar of rescue. He turned the tide; he snatched victory 
from defeat; he saved the army; his heroic hand wrote 'Buena 
Vista' in letters of everlasting glory on our proud escutcheon. 
I greeted him then, a hero, my countryman, my brother, my 
rescuer. He is no less so this day, and I would strike the shackles 
from his aged limbs and make him as free as the vital air of 
heaven, and clothe him with every right I enjoy, had I the 
power." 

That was the chivalrous sentiment one of the bravest 
soldiers who ever girded sword on thigh held of another brave 
soldier, an adversary, who was then a fallen chieftain. 

As a patriot: — 

He was ever ready to give up personal ambi- 
tion to serve his country. He bore in his body and 
soul the deepest anguish for his people whose 
representative he was. 

As a humanitarian: — 

He loved his fellowmen, and never willingly 
was known to harm them. He grieved for the 
fallen brave whether in victory or defeat. 

He travailed in agony over the rejection of 
exchange of prisoners or of medical aid for the 
Andersonville prisoners. 

As a slaveholder: — 

He loved his negroes and taught them the 
Word of God. He resented colonization and said, 
"The South is the home of the negro, for we know 
him and he knows us." 

If told anything derogatory of any one of his 
negroes he said, "I will ask him about it." The 
servant was always heard in his own defense. 

12 



Milo Cooper, Davis' body servant, at one time 
living in Florida, hurried to New Orleans when he 
heard the news of President Davis' illness, and 
entering the room burst into tears and threw him- 
self on his knees in prayer that God would spare 
his old Master and bless those so dear to him. 

Among the telegrams received after his death 
was one from his former servants: "We, the old 
servants of our beloved master, have cause to mingle 
our tears over his death. He was always so kind 
and thoughtful of our peace and happiness. We 
extend our humble sympathy." 

Jim Jones, who was with Davis when arrested, 
says he never saw a braver man. 

As a philanthropist: — - 

He always gave liberally of his means to ad- 
vance every good object. 

He deeded his old birthplace at Fairview for a 
Baptist Church in memory of his father, and gave 
also a beautiful silver communion service. 

As a Christian: — 

He was ever an humble follower of Him of 
Whom he was ready to testify. When the news 
came that Lee must fall back from Petersburg, 
which meant the evacuation of Richmond, and 
a possible surrender, he was found on his knees 
in prayer in St. Paul's Church, Richmond, 
Va. 

Dr. Craven, his prison physician, gave this testimony: 

"The more I saw of him the more I was convinced of his 
sincere religious convictions. He impressed me more with the 
divine Origin of God's Word than any professor of Christianity 
I ever met." 

Did his Christianity extend to forgiveness of his enemies? 
A Northern man, Ridpath, the historian, a guest at Beauvoir, 
testified that during his visit he never heard one word of bitter- 
ness toward any man. A quotation from a speech made to the 
Mississippi Legislature March 10, 1884, will in itself suffice to 
answer this question. 

"Our people have accepted that decree; it therefore behooves 

13 



them, as they may, to promote the general welfare of the Union, 
to show to the world that hereafter as heretofore, the patriotism 
of our people is not measured by lines of latitude and longitude, 
but is as broad as the obligations they have assumed and em- 
braces the whole of our ocean-bound domain. Let them leave 
to their children's children the good example of never swerving 
from the path of duty, and PREFERRING TO RETURN 
GOOD FOR EVIL RATHER THAN TO CHERISH THE 
UNMANLY FEELING OF REVENGE." 

Would one think from this that President Davis regretted 
the stand he took in '61? Never! Hear him again in that same 
speech : 

'.'It has been said that I should apply to the United States 
for a pardon; but repentance must precede the right of pardon, 
and I have not repented. Remembering, as I must, all which 
has been suffered, all which has been lost, disappointed hopes, 
and crushed aspirations, yet I deliberately say, if it were to do 
over again, I would do just as I did in 1861." 

Would one say Avhile stressing loyalty to the Union and to 
the National flag. President Davis meant that our children should 
be taught to forget the things for which their fathers fought? 

Not at all! Hear him again: 

"Never teach your children to admit that their fathers were 
wrong in their effort to maintain the sovereignty, freedom and 
independence which was their inalienable birthright. I cannot 
believe that the causes for which our sacrifices were made can 
ever be lost, but rather hope that those who now deny the justice 
of our asserted claims will learn from experience that the fathers 
builded wisely and the Constitution should be construed accord- 
ing to the commentaries of those men who made it." 

Davis' life touched many Southern States. His mother 
was from South Carolina; his father was from Georgia; he was 
born in Kentucky; he lived in Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi 
and Virginia; and he fought to free Texas. 

Jerome E. Titlow, the one sent to manacle him, said, 
"Upon him criticism expended all its arrows and yet no blemish 
was found." 

Men who did not love him or admire him as a politician 
were forced to acknowledge his fine traits of character. This is 
what the editor of the New York World said of him when the 
news came of his death: 

"Jefferson Davis was a man of commanding ability, spotless 
integrit}^ controlling conscience, and a temper so resolute that 

14 



at times it approached obstinacy. He was proud, sensitive 
and honorable in all his dealings and in every relation of life." 

The editor of the New York Sun said : 

"Amid irreparable disaster, Jefferson Davis was sustained 
by a serene consciousness that he had done a man's work accord- 
ing to his lights, and that, while unable to command success, 
he had striven to deserve it. Even among those who looked 
upon him with least sympathy it was felt that he bore defeat 
and humiliation in the highest Roman fashion." 

The worst things that any of his enemies could find to say 
of him were that he was "a man of the strongest prejudices, the 
harshest obstinacy, and the most ungovernable fondness for 
parasites;" that he had "a grudge against Jos. E. Johnston," 
and that he made a fatal error in having Hood displace him in 
the Atlanta Campaign; that ht was unjust to Beauregard and 
partial to Bragg and Northrop; that he always favored West 
Point men, and was most unjust to men with no military train- 
ing. He was accused of leaning to imperialism. The same ac- 
cusation brought against President Wilson today is the one that 
was brought against President Davis then — that is, that he was 
an autocrat and wanted to have his own way, and tried to 
force Congress to do his will. Mistakes were made, but where 
was there ever an executive that made no mistakes? 

Not one could touch his character morally — pure in thought, 
pure in speech, pure in life, and pure in religious professions. 
His mistakes had to be conceded were of the head — not the heart. 
Why is it that such a character as this is not oftener held up by 
ministers of the gospel, public speakers and teachers for the 
youth of our land to emulate? 

Bishop Gaylor paid a fine tribute to Jefferson Davis. He 
said: 

"The character of Mr. Davis as a man, as a soldier, as 
a statesman, and as a President, has passed into history, and our 
children will be better able than we are rightly to estimate his 
place in the records of our country. To say that he was a knight- 
ly and chivalrous Christian gentleman, brave, true, consistent, 
without a stain upon his honor, without a moral blot upon his 
fame, is simple justice — that some day the world will recognize. 
That he deserves and should receive the unstinted and uninter- 
rupted honor of those to whom the Southern Confederacy is a 
sacred memory, no reasonable man can question. 'The fierce 
light that beats against the throne' threw into bold relief the 
outlines of his character, and he became the shining mark for 

15 



criticism. But whatever else may be said, he alone embodied 
and represented with consistent and patient heroism to the day 
of his death the cause for which he had sacrificed all that men 
hold dear." 

"God, I believe, judges men by their motives. Jefferson 
Davis, in his heart, was an honest patriot." — {See Wrongs of 
History Righted, p. 22.) 

Abraham Lincoln was a martyr and died by an assassin's 
bullet; Jefferson Davis, too, was a martyr but he was forced for 
more than twenty years to live out a life of martyrdom. Sudden 
death would have been preferable. 

It is easy to die in the moment of victory, but hard to live 
under defeat. If there should be any glorification it should 
better come to Jefferson Davis than Abraham Lincoln. 

"Hugh McCulloch said he admired Lincoln for his unwavering 
adherence to principle; for his personal righteousness; for his 
humanity; for his patriotism and for his desire for peace and for 
his love of his fellowmen. 

It was Jefferson Davis not Abraham Lincoln who stood 
for the principles as laid down by the Declaration of 1776, and 
the Constitution. 

It was Jefferson Davis not Lincoln who stood for personal 
righteousness; his life private and public was on ^ of absolute 
rectitude. 

It was Jefferson Davis not Lincoln who stood for humanity 
and pleaded for those Andersonville prisoners whom Lincoln 
could have relieved and would not. 

It was Jefferson Davis not Lincoln who was the patriot 
and sacrificed personal ambition for the sake of his country. 

It was Jefferson Davis not Abraham Lincoln who pleaded 
for peace and did all to enforce it and Lincoln it was who refused 
four times to make it when he could. 

It was Jefferson Davis not Lincoln who was a lover of his 
fellowmen and agonized over the suffering and dying on the 
battlefield, and it was Davis not Lincoln who loved the slaves 
too much to see them freed suddenly because so totally unpre- 
pared for freedom. 

No man has been more misrepresented in history who less 
deserved it. 

When Senator George F. Hoar, of Massachusetts, in the 
United States Senate, began that abuse of Jefferson Davis 
L. Q. C. Lamar quietly retorted, "When Prometheus was chained 
to the rock, it was the vulture and not the eagle that buried its 

16 



cruel beak in his vitals and tore and tortured him." This is 
the finest retort recorded in parliamentary history, and it was 
effectual — since that day no man in the United States Senate or 
House of Representatives has dared utter words derogatory of 
the man who for four years stood for all the South stood for. 

Singular as it may seem Henry Watterson, a Southern man 
and a Confederate soldier is Abraham Lincoln's greatest glori- 
fier, and Charles Francis Adams, a Northern historian, grandson 
of John Quincy Adams and a Union soldier has paid highest 
tribute to Jefferson Davis. He said: "No fatal mistakes 
either of administration or strategy were made which can be 
fairly laid to his account. He did the best possible with the means 
that he had at his command. Merely the opposing forces were 
too many and too strong for him. Of his austerity, earnestness 
and fidelity there can be no more question that can be entertained 
of his capacity." 

JEFFERSON DAVIS' FIRST MARRIAGE. 

Legend deals freely with the lives and loves of most great 
men, but traditions about the early love affairs of Jefferson Davis 
are very few. At the time of his first marriage he was not a 
famous man, and so little happened about his love affairs that 
would be remembered except by intimate friends and those 
directly concerned. 

After he became famous tradition began its work, and so 
we have a mass of conflicting stories, most of which had no 
foundation. 

Walter Fleming has written a paper for the Mississippi His- 
torical Society on Jefferson Davis' first marriage, in which he 
attempts to extract from numerous contradictory records and 
accounts the true story of the marriage of Jefferson Davis and 
Sarah Knox Taylor. 

When Jefferson Davis served in the LTnited States Army 
on the north-western frontier, life at military posts was monoto- 
nous in the extreme. The coming- of a woman to any of those 
posts was an event to be celebrated. At Fort Winnebago, 
where Davis served for two years, there was for a time no white 
woman. Later there were two, but both were married. 

When a young officer had the good fortune to be transferred 
to a post where there were young women, he was usually in a 
susceptible mood. So it was with Jefferson Davis, who in 1831, 
after a three years' tour of arduous duty in the woods and on the 
plains of Wisconsin and Iowa, was ordered to Fort Crawford. 

17 



1/ 



The home of Colonel Zachary Taylor was the center of 
social life there. Mrs. Taylor, after long and rough frontier 
experience, had learned to make her home anywhere. She had 
three daughters, Anne, Sarah Knox and Betty. Sarah Knox 
was 18 years of age when Davis met her, and she was her father's 
favorite. 

Life was very monotonous at the fort and to while away the 
time the women and girls occupied themselves at Indian bead- 
work. The only souvenir of Sarah Taylor in existence is a small 
reticule worked with colored beads which is in the possession 
of a grand-daughter of Mary Street, who was a close friend of 
Sarah's. 

Davis spent most of his time, we are told, in reading law, 
but was often thrown with the young people and soon formed 
an attachment and became engaged to Sarah Knox. 

By most people it would have been considered a good match. 
Davis was a fine ofificer. Personally, he was attractive, though 
reserved and considered austere by some. 

One who knew Davis when he was an officer in the United 
States army, and saw him while he was engaged to Sarah Taylor, 
said this: "I shall never forget him as I first saw him, a young 
lieutenant in the United States army, straight as an arrow, 
handsome and elegant. It was at the Governor's Mansion in 
Detroit; my brother was Governor of Michigan; Lieutenant 
Davis was our guest; the Black Hawk War in which he had great- 
ly distinguished himself was just ended, and he was bringing 
Black Hawk through the country. I was much impressed with 
the young lieutenant." 

Col. Taylor wanted his daughter to marry a business man 
and not an officer in the army. Sarah had been educated in the 
East and had always lived in comfort. Mrs. Taylor agreed with 
her husband that their daughter must not sufTer the hardships 
of frontier life and so the marriage was forbidden. But Sarah 
had much of her father's decision of character, and so the lovers 
would not accept as final the parents' decision. 

Sarah would not break her engagement to please her father, 
and Davis was forbidden the house, but they met at the home of 
friends and Betty Taylor described them as "ideal lovers." 

In 1833 Davis left Fort Crawford to join the New Dragoon 
Regiment at Fort Gibson in the Indian Territory. 

During the two years he was in the West, Davis and Miss 
Taylor kept up their correspondence. 

During the War Between the States all the papers Davis 

18 



left at his Mississippi home were confiscated and among the 
papers, a Federal soldier, named Spillman Willis, of 33rd Illinois 
Regiment, found a letter from Davis to Miss Sarah Knox 
Taylor, written at Fort Gibson and dated December 16, 1834. 
I wish that the letter were not so long so that it could be included 
in this paper. 

He tells her of his dreams about her, and his jealousies. 
He longed to look into her eyes, so eloquent of purity and love. 
He tells her that he has no secrets from her, and that there must 
be no formality between them, and signed his letter "Jeff." And 
so we find him like all other lovers. 

In 1835 he sent in his resignation, and was granted leave of 
absence during the month of June, and so he left Fort Gibson 
and went to St. Louis and made arrangements for his wedding. 

There are many conflicting stories about the elopement and 
marriage, also about Col. Taylor's conduct. These reports 
are too long to be given in this paper. Some have said that Tay- 
lor never forgave his daughter and others say that although he 
forbade the marriage, yet they were never estranged. There 
are letters in the Boston Public Library from Col. Taylor to Col. 
Davis written in 1846, showing that there was no ill feeling. 

When Taylor was President of the United States, Davis 
was a frequent visitor at the White House, and members of the 
Taylor family were his dearest friends. 

But to return to the wedding. Miss Taylor was in Ken- 
tucky and the wedding took place at Beechland, home of John 
Gibson Taylor, and we have Davis' own statement that "In 
1835 I resigned from the army, and Miss Taylor being in Ken- 
tucky with her aunt, the oldest sister of General Taylor, I went 
thither and we were married in the presence of Gen. Taylor's 
two sisters, of his oldest brother, of his son-in-law, and many 
other members of the family." 

This statement omits many details which have been handed 
down by the Taylor family. 

Mrs. Anna Magee Robinson, who was one of the Taylor 
children present at the wedding, said: "My cousin Knox Taylor 
was very beautiful, slight and not very tall, with brown wavy 
hair and clear gray eyes, very lovely and lovable, and a young 
woman of decided spirit. She was dressed in a traveling dress 
with a small hat to match. Lieutenant Davis was dressed in a 
long tail cutaway coat, brocaded waist-coat, breeches tight 
fitting and held under the instep with a strap. He had on a 

19 



high stove-pipe hat. He was of slender build, and had polished 
manners, and was of a quiet intellectual countenance." 

The ceremoney was performed by Rev. M. Ashe, rector of 
Christ's Church in Louisville. In Mr. Fleming's paper may be 
found a letter written by Sarah Taylor to her mother on her 
wedding day. 

After the ceremony the bride and groom left for Mississippi 
to visit Joseph E. Davis at his plantation called "Hurricane." 

Joseph E. Davis was the oldest brother of Jefferson Davis, 
and he gave to his brother Jeff a tract of land known as "Briar- 
f^eld." 

From Warrenton, Miss., Mrs. Davis wrote her last letter 
to her mother. On a visit to his sister-in-law in Louisiana Davis 
and his wife both fell ill with malarial fever. His wife died, and 
was buried in Locust Grove Cemetery, and there in a dark 
grove is her neglected tomb today. It is related that once after 
her death, Davis in looking through the contents of an old trunk 
came upon one of her slippers, and was so overcome by emotion 
that he lost consciousness. 

He lived in seclusion at Briarfield for more than eight years 
after her death. 

Nothing but a crumbling chimney remainsof the Mississippi 
home to which Davis brought his young bride in the morning 
of the century. 

Half a hundred years after his first wife's death, a gray 
old man, whose deeds rank him with the Immortals, made his 
last visit to Briarfield, there contracted the same fever that had 
killed his young wife, and made the journey down the river to 
New Orleans to die.* 

An Incident {Copied from an old neivs paper): Queer 
things happen in this world. A few years ago a young man on 
the banks of the southern Mississippi eloped with the daughter 
of an old planter, as the father would not consent to the mar- 
riage. Time rolled on; the daughter died, and the father and 
the widowed husband met on the bloody but victorious field of 
Buena Vista. On that terrible day, amid scenes of carnage and 
valor, the gallant young hero sustained well and nobly the gal- 
lantry of his countrymen, and the old hero, extending to him his 
hand for the first time since the marriage of his daughter, said: 
"Sir, my daughter was a better judge of character than I am. 
Here is my hand." 

"This sketch of President Davis' first marriage was sent in by the Chas. E. Hooker Chap- 
ter, Hazlehurst, Miss. 

20 



Two years have passed away. A President is to be 
inaugurated. The son-in-law, now a member of the United 
States Senate, is appointed chairman of a committee to wait upon 
the President and inform him of his election. Then again the 
father and son-in-law met. That was a proud day for Jefferson 
Davis. It was his hour of victory. We would rather have been 
Davis than Taylor. The sweetest whisperings of the spirit 
voice of the "departed one" must have been with him there. 

JEFFERSON DAVIS' SECOND MARRIAGE— HIS 
CHILDREN 

After the death of his wife, Sarah Knox Taylor, Capt. 
Davis went to Cuba, and when he returned he remained quietly 
eight years on his plantation, Briarfield, which had been a mar- 
riage gift from his brother Joseph. His bride had only lived 
three months and his grief was great at her loss. 

He met later Miss Varina Banks Howell, the daughter of 
William Burr Howell, and descendant of Lieut. Howell of the 
War of 1812 and of Gen. Howell of Revolutionary fame. Her 
home was Natchez, Miss. She was a woman of many gifts and 
charms — quite literary — all of her life accustomed to a social 
life. She, therefore, was in many ways a fit companion of Mr. 
Davis, not only in the Cabinet circles in Washington City but 
was ready to meet the requiremsnts of the "Lady of the White 
Hoyse" in Richmond during the days of the Confederacy. 

There were five children that came into the home: Marga- 
ret, who later married Addison Hayes of Denver, Colorado; 
Anne Varina, called by her father lovingly "WINNIE" and 
named by General John B. Gordon, "The Daugh- 
ter OF THE Confederacy"; and three sons, one killed 
by a fall as a child, and both of the others died before 
the father or mother. Winnie outlived her father but died in 
1898 at Narragansett Pier, where she had gone for her health. 
Mrs. Davis never recovered from the shock of her death and fol- 
lowed her in a short tine. 

Winnie was a war baby, born in Richmond in 1864. She 
had the most wonderful charm of manner, drawing all with 
whom she came in contact with cords of love. Her memory 
was remarkable, seeming never to forget any she ever met. 
She was also quite literary in her tastes and contributed for 
several years to the leading periodicals of the North. 

No woman of the South so endeared herself to its people. 
She possessed intelligence, culture and refinement, and, gifted 

21 



with a charming personality, she made friends wherever she went, 
and the South truly mourned her when she died. The United 
Daughters of the Confederacy erected in the Hollywood Ceme- 
tery at Richmond a beautiful white marble monument to her 
memory, and the Georgia Division U. D. C, the beautiful Win- 
nie Davis Dormitory, built in old Southern style, which is used 
by daughters of Confederate soldiers while attending the State 
Normal School at Athens, Georgia. Many chapters of the 
Daughters and Children of the Confederacy and schools have 
been named for her in the different States. 

She was educated in Europe and possessed the rare accom- 
plishments that travel gives. She wrote three books. One is 
"An Irish Knight," the story of the life of Robert Emmett. 
It is said the description of the knight in this book was meant by 
her for a pictui-e of her father in his trials. Another book is 
"The Veiled Doctor," and the third is "Romance of Summer 
Seas," and besides these she wrote many magazine articles. 
She and her mother felt after President Davis died that it was 
best to leave Beauvoir, for they were not able to keep open house, 
as many expected them still to do, and besides it was better to 
be in New York to be near the publishers of their books. Many 
blamed them, but those who knew them well felt that it meant no 
disloyalty to the South. 

It was thought by many that this beautiful home of Beau- 
voir in. Mississippi was a gift from a friend, Mrs. Sarah Dorsey, 
but it was not. (See Vol. IV, ''Our Leaders.") Mr. and Mrs. 
Davis purchased it before Mrs. Dorsey's death, and the deed of 
purchase is to be seen in the Confederate Museum at Rich- 
mond. Mrs. Dorsey did mention them in her will, and this may 
have given rise to the mis-statement . 

In mind, manners and heart President Davis was a type of 
that old race of Southern gentlemen whom these bustling times 
are fast crowding out of our civilization. He did not seek nor 
desire to be President of the Confederacy, preferring to be the 
Commander-in-Chief of the army of Confederate soldiers, but 
when placed in the executive chair by the voice and will of his 
constituents, he accepted without a murmur and was faithful 
to the cause even unto death. 

He died in New Orleans, Louisiana, 1889, and was buried 
there, as his wife desired, but two years afterwards his body was 
removed to Richmond, Virginia, the fitting burial place of the 
chieftain of the Confederacy, and the highest respect and honors 
were shown as the body passed through the Southern States on 

22 



the way to its final resting place. There has been unveiled at 
Richmond a very handsome monument which was erected 
to his memory by Confederate Sons and Daughters. 

Mrs. Davis wrote a Memoir of him, and she was well 
qualified to do this as she was her husband's confidante during 
those memorable years of his life. 

DAVIS MEMORIAL PARK. 

There is an effort being made by the Jefferson Davis 
Home Association to preserve the place of President 
Davis' birth as a Memorial Park. This spot at Fairview, Ky.. 
has been placed in the hands of the U. D. C. Chapters at Fair- 
view as custodians. President Davis before his death visited 
this spot and presented the land for a Baptist Church to be built 
upon it. In his speech of presentation he said it seemed strange 
that as he belonged to the Episcopal Church he should give this 
land for a Baptist Church, but it was in memory of his father 
-who was a Baptist. This was in March, 1886. Mr. Davis 

said: 

"After many a long and weary wandering, I return to the 
place of my birth, and I come with those feelings which ever cling 
around the heart of every man who feels that he treads upon his 
native soil. My friends, my condition is not unlike that of 
some tempest-tossed mariner, who, turning to his home with 
high hopes, is shipwrecked upon the coast and finds himself 
stranded and cast helpless upon the shore to which he hoped to 
return and bear rich treasure and gifts for his loved ones. 
But it would indeed be ungrateful for me to dwell on such sad 
thoughts when before me is presented this grand galaxy of happy, 
friendly faces." 

He explained that the family left the place during his in- 
fancy, but he had visited it once before; that then and now he 
felt like exclaiming: "This is my own, my native land." After 
a tribute to the worthy purpose to which his birthplace had been 
consecrated, he concluded with this remark: "I come only to 
tender you formally the site upon which this building stands." 
Then, raising his face upward and extending his hands in the 
attitude of blessing, he said with tones of deepest solemnity: 
"May He who rules in heaven and on earth bless individually 
and collectively this whole community, and may His benedic- 
tions rest on this house always!" 

Mr. Davis presented the congregation a solid silver salver 
and chalice for the communion service. Shortly after the dedi- 

23 



cation, Mr. Davis returned to Clarksville, Tenn., and after a 
visit to M. H. Clark, his secretary, in Richmond, he returned to 
Beauvoir, Miss. This was his last visit to the scene of his birth. 

The log house in which Mr. Davis was born was constructed 
from timbers cut in the neighboring forest. It was purchased 
in 1897 by the Rev. J. W. Bingham and associates and removed 
to the Nashville Centennial Exposition, where it was placed on 
exhibition. Its location now is unknown. 

On Sunday Mr. Davis attended divine services at the Epis- 
copal church in the morning and at the Baptist church at night. 
On Monday he went to Fairview and spent several hours in his 
old home. 

Dr. C. C. Brown, of Bowling Green, conceived the idea 
of founding the memorial, and he has been ardent for its success. 
The undertaking included at first a large area of the land long 
ago owned by the father, Samuel C. Davis, at Davisburg (now 
Fairview) ; but the committee, after visiting the premises, con- 
cluded that a smaller area would be preferable. Upon this 
choice ground, including several residences, options were se- 
cured, and to save them to the committee. Gen. Bennett H. 
Young, commanding the Kentucky Division, United Confed- 
erate Veterans, advanced the cash necessary to complete the 
purchase. The Davis Memorial Home is therefore established, 
and it is to be a Mecca, the Mount Vernon of Kentucky, a credit 
to the South and the country at large in proportion to the liber- 
ality of those who honor the memory of the Confederacy's only 
President. 

The Association hopes to raise about $20,000. They wish 
to have a concrete Shelter House with four stained glass windows 
representing the four Confederate flags. Then have the door- 
way marked "Jefferson Davis Memorial" on a bronze plate. 

This land is on the proposed Jefferson Davis Highway 
and it will be but fitting that something worth while be 
erected. The Association has already put a beautiful stone 
fence on the two avenue sides. Miss Florence Barlow, Peewee 
Valley, Ky., is Director General. 

It was the Margaret Jones Chapter, U. D. C, 
Waynesboro, Ga., that first secured legislation to have Jrfiferson 
Davis' birthday, June 3, made a state holiday. Other States 
are following this lead. 



24 



Summed up, the United States government is indebted to 

Jefferson Davis for the following services: 

Educated at West I^oint Academy. 

Lieutenant in the U. S. Army. 

Distinguished services in the Black Hawk War. 

Served valiantly in the war with Mexico. 

Hero at Monterey; wounded at Buena Vista; scaled the walls of the City 
of Mexico. 

He introduced the wedge movement and saved the day at Buena Vista. 
United States Senator from Mississippi. 
Secretary of War in Pierce's cabinet. 

First to suggest trans-continental railroads connecting the Atlantic 
with the Pacific. 

First to suggest camels as ships of the uninhabitable West to convey 
military stores. 

First to suggest buying Panama Canal Zone. 
First to suggest buying Cuba. 

He planned American trade with China and Japan. 
He suggested closer relations with South America. 
He urged preparedness for war. 
He enlarged the U. S. Army by four regiments. 
He organized cavalry service adapted to our needs. 
He introduced light infantry or rifle system of tactics. 
He caused the manufacture of guns, rifles and pistols. 
He rendered invaluable services to Colt's Armory. 
He ordered the frontier surveyed. 

He put young officers in training for surveying expeditions. 
He sent George B. McClellan to Crimea to study the military tactics of 
the British and Russian armies. 

He appointed Robert E. Lee as Superintendent of West Point. 

He advanced Albert Sidney Johnston to important posts. 

He had forts repaired and many of them rebuilt. 

He strengthened forts on the Western frontier, frequently drawing on 
arsenals in the South to do it. 

He had the western part of the continent explored for scientific, geo- 
graphical and railroad work. 

He was responsible for the new Senate Hall, the new House of Represen- 
tatives, and for the extension of many of the public buildings in Washington, 
especially the Treasury Building. 

He was responsible for the construction of the aqueduct system in the 
Nation's capital. 

He was responsible for "Armed Liberty" on the Capitol having a helmet 
of eagle feathers instead of the cap of a pagan goddess. 

He had Cabin John Bridge built with its span of 220 feet. 

He was United States Senator under President Buchanan. 

He was nominated for President by Massachusetts men in 1860. 

He refused to allow his name to be presented for President at the Charles- 
ton Convention. 

He stood strongly for the Union, but stressed the constitutional right of 
a State to secede. 

He did secede with Mississippi, as he had been taught at West Point. 

He stood for what Lincoln preached but did not practice — "not to over- 
throw the Constitution, but to overthrow the men who perverted the Consti- 
tution." 

25 



PART TWO 



THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES 
1861-1865. 

ABRAHAM LINCOLN, 
Born Feb. 12, 1809. Died April 14, 1865. 

To write the life of Abraham Lincoln is no easy task. Had 
he lived out his allotted years it would not be difficult, but his 
death by the cruel hand of an assassin caused him who had been 
vilified in life to be glorified in death. 

The St. Louis Globe Democrat, March 6, 1898, said, "where 
now is the man so rash as to even warmly criticize Abraham 
Lincoln?" One adverse comment subjects one to the accusa- 
tion either of prejudice or injustice. 

In seeking the truth about him, it would be most unjust 
to take only the testimony of his enemies, and it would be equal- 
ly as unjust to take only the testimony of his glorifiers. Lincoln 
was a man as other men with weak points and strong points of 
character, and the fairest testimony ought to come from those 
who knew him best, loved him well, honored him and yet were 
friendly enough, truthful enough and just enough to see and 
acknowledge his faults. 

William H. Herndon and Ward H. Lamon from youth 
up were the closest and most trusted friends of Abraham Lin- 
coln. They knew him and loved him in his days of poverty, 
and they were devoted friends of his in his days of power and 
high fortune. Both, after their friend's death, desired to write 
his life as they knew it; both scorned his glorifiers as much as 
they scorned his detractors, and both have given faithful por- 
traits of the man they loved. No one ever questioned or doubted 
the fairness of these biographies when they were first written — 
Herndon's just after Lincoln's death, and Lamon's when Hern- 
don's had been destroyed ; and it is mainly from these biographies 
this sketch is taken. No adverse quotation shall be given from 
any Southern writer. 

Herndojj and Lincoln were practically in daily contact for 
over twenty years and their relations were always amicable, 
although Herndon was an abolitionist and Lincoln was not, 

26 



and Herndon testified that he had a hard time trying to win 
his friend over to his belief. 

Life went hard with Herndon in later years after Lincoln's 
death. He fell heir to a farm near Springfield, III., dropped 
the law and went into fancy stock raising, which soon resulted 
disastrously. He took to hard drinking and died in poverty. 
He had been Lincoln's law partner for over sixteen years, so he 
knew him as an intimate friend and loved him with the love of 
a brother. 

His biography of Lincoln is acknowledged to have been the 
best that has ever been written, because it is true to facts, and 
Lincoln's faults — while not magnified — were not covered. He 
said Lincoln would never have stood for a biography that was 
not true. 

Ward Lamon began his biography, but hearing that Hern- 
don had written one, laid his aside and decided to wait. In 
1872, knowing that Herndon's work had been destroyed — even 
the publisher's plates broken to pieces — he paid Herndon $3,000 
for the privilege of using his material, and this biography was 
published and also pronounced good. However, by 1903 all of 
these copies were spirited away, and it is almost impossible to 
find even a second-hand copy of either Herndon's or Lamon's 
Life of Lincoln. * 

Ward H. Lamon, like Herndon, was a man whom Lincoln 
loved, and one who loved Lincoln. He was selected to accom- 
pany the President when he went in disguise to the capital. 
This disguise was no disgrace, however, but Lamon told him 
it would be considered unmanly, for there w^as no need to fear 
assassination at that time; and there was not, so this disguise 
looked cowardly. 

Lincoln appointed Lamon LTnited States Marshal of the 
District of Columbia, in order to be a body guard to him, for he 
knew Lamon loved him and would protect him. At times, it 
is said, Lamon often would act as private secretary for the Presi- 
dent. In this position, he was able to know both the animus 
and the friendship of the men of Lincoln's Cabinet. Into his 
ears Lincoln poured many of his troubles, small and great. 

Nicolay and Hay were also his secretary at different 
times, and friends of his who had lived at Springfield. Nicolay 
said, "Robert E. Lee should have been hanged as a traitor." 
This makes him a biased writer and slow to be followed. Hay 

*UnIess recently destroyed, Herndon's "True Story of a Great Life" may be found in 
Pratt's Library, Baltimore; Peabody's Library, Baltimore; and Congressional Library, Wash- 
ington. D. Appleton & Co., published the second Edition, with introduction by Horace White 

27 



said, "Lincoln, right or wrong, we will stand by him." This 
makes him an unfair writer and not to be followed. 

Many are the legendary stories told of Abraham Lincoln's 
youthful days. Many myths have been repeated until it is hard 
at this day to get from this mass what can be relied upon as 
truth. After a careful search among the sources which are most 
just to him, the following facts are gathered: 

Abraham Lincoln was born in Hardin County, Ky., Feb. 
12, 1809. His childhood was a sad and unhappy one. His 
mother was in poor health, a disappointed wife, overworked and 
discouraged, and her sadness affected the child. Thomas 
Lincoln, whom she had married, was an unambitious, easy- 
going, shiftless man, satisfied with shabby surroundings, and 
never felt the slightest responsibility in caring for others. He 
seemed perfectly indifferent to the comfort or happiness of his 
wife and her son. She, poor creature, died a consumptive in 
1818 leaving only one child, Abraham, a boy of nine years of 
age. She could read and write, but her husband could not, so 
she was very anxious that her child should not grow up in ignor- 
ance. She taught Abe his letters and then taught him to spell, 
to read and to write. She encouraged him and urged him to 
grow up to be a man — not idle and ignorant — but to do something 
worth while. She made an earnest effort to instill ambition into 
the child. There was little in the cabin home to bring brightness 
or joy — no comforts, no amusements, no diversions — nothing 
but poverty and hard work. This intercourse with his mother 
was the child's only pleasure — learning to read and write and 
cipher while he watched her sad face, wondering what it was she 
wanted him to know and do and why. 

When his mother died there were no funeral services; she 
was simply put in the grave and left there, for this home was not 
a Christian home. It is said that the young boy realized that 
other people who died did have funerals, he walked a 
long way to ask a minister to come and have a funeral for his 
mother. Three months had passed, but the minister, Mr. 
Head, who had performed the marriage ceremony for Thomas 
Lincoln and Nancy Hanks, did come and a funeral service was 
held over the grave in the presence of about twenty onlookers. 

Before the year was out, Thomas Lincoln had married again, 
and to this stepmother, who was a widow Johnston with one son 
and two daughters, Abraham Lincoln was more indebted than 
to any other one person. She was young, she was cheerful, she 
was energetic, and she greatly improved the looks of things in 

28 



the home. Then, too, she took a great fancy to the sad, mother- 
less boy who seemed absolutely without an earthly friend. 

Mr. Lincoln had moved to Indiana several years before this 
marriage, and Mrs. Johnston had heard that he was a well-to- 
do farmer and worth marrying, so was greatly disappointed when 
she reached her new home. However, she determined to make 
the best of a bad bargain. She apparently made no difference 
between Abe and her own children in the home, and her daugh- 
ters became very fond of the young boy and preferred in later 
years his home to that of their own brother. Abe appreciated 
all that this good stepmother did for him, and often said all that 
he accomplished in life was due to this sainted mother. She 
said in speaking of him, "Abe never gave me a cross word or 
look, and he never refused to do anything I asked him to do." 

She roused Abe's ambition, and, as he grew older, he read 
every book he could lay his hand on. He acquired a habit of 
writing down anything that struck him — then learned it and 
repeated it. They were too poor to have any lights to study by 
at night, save the fire light, and there, after a hard day's work, 
Abe would be found reading, writing and ciphering. He bor- 
rowed an arithmetic, as they were too poor to buy one. He 
worked his sums on the back of the shovel and then scraped ofi 
the shovel to begin again. 

His work was very hard even when a child — he worked in 
the field and did the drudgery about the home and later he went 
on a ferryboat, he split rails, he clerked in a store, he became 
postmaster, he did all sorts of odd jobs for the farmers around — 
ploughing, sowing and reaping. Abe Lincoln was not lazy. 
The first money he made he shared with his stepmother. 

At the age of twenty-one, he left home never to return 
except on visits. Thomas Lincoln had never appreciated the 
boy and home was never home to him if Thomas Lincoln was in 
it — so he visited it only once or twice after this during his life- 
time. His stepmother continued to take an interest in him after 
her husband's death, and when she heard he was running for 
President of the LTnited States, she greatly grieved and said she 
didn't want him elected — she seemed to fear some evil would 
come to him. When he went to tell her goodby, she kissed him 
with tears streaming from her eyes and said, "Goodby, Abe, I 
shall never see you again," and she did not. 

Lincoln had studied law in Springfield, borrowing a copy 
of Blackstone from a friend. He became a good lawyer, settling 
in Springfield, 111. He was very ungainly in appearance, with a 

29 



very homely face, but there was strength and firmness in it. 
He never even when President cared about his personal appear- 
ance or how his clothes fitted. 

Abraham Lincoln's married life was not happy. He had 
three romances connected with his early days. One, -AnryP^-f^A^ 
Rutledge, belonged to his own social circle. Had he married 
her possibly his whole life would have been changed, but unfor- 
tunately she died while attending school. His other loves were 
Mary Owens and Mary Todd. He really loved neither, but in 
turn addressed each, became engaged to each, but advised both 
not to marry him, as he did not belong to their social set. It is 
said that Mary Owens jilted him, which greatly mortified him, 
but Marj' Todd agreed to marry him. The day, January 1, ^ 
1842, was appointed, the bride and attendants were waiting at ^ 
the church, but no bridegroom appeared. It is said that his 
most intimate friends were never able to account for Lincoln's 
behavior upon this occasion. Mary Todd forgave him, however, 
and married him one year later. It was a most unfortunate 
marriage, for she was not suited to make him happy, and while 
children came into the home, there was no real joy, for that can 
only come from a perfectly congenial atmosphere. He lost one 
of his sons while living at Springfield, 111., and he became very 
morose and melancholy. This boy's name was Willie; then 
another son was buried at Georgetown; then there was Tad 
(the one with a defective palate), so greatly petted by his father; 
and Robert, the only child who survived him by many years. 

Lincoln had great influence among his companions and 
friends and was always a leader. When the Black Hawk War . 

came on, he raised a company and they made him Captain. K\^|r Kf 



Lieut. Jefferson Davis of United States army mustere^Jiimhito o 



service. He ran for the legislature and was defeated, but after- 
wards elected. He became a member of Congress in 1846. 
Then in 1860 was a candidate for United States President on 
the Republican ticket upon an anti-slave extension platform 
and was elected. He was no abolitionist, as his speech at Peoria, 
>^ 111., Oct. 16, 1854, will testify. — i^See '^Abraham Lincoln' by 
Nicolay and Hay, Vol. 1, p. 186.) 

"Before proceeding let me say that I think I have no pre- 
judice against the Southern people. They are just what we 
would be in their situation. If slavery did not now exist among 
them, they would not introduce it. If it did exist now among us, 
we would not instantly give it up. This I believe of the masses, 
North and South. Doubtless there are individuals on both 

30 






sides who would not hold slaves under any circumstances, and 
others who would gladly introduce slavery anew, if it were not 
in existence. We know that som^ Southern men do free their 
slaves, go North and become tip-top abolitionists, while some 
Northern men go South and become most cruel slave masters. 

"When Southern people tell us that they are no more re- 
sponsible for the origin of slavery than we are, I acknowledge 
the fact. When it is said the institution exists, and it is very 
difficult to get rid of in any satisfactory way, I can understand 
and appreciate the saying. I surely will not blame them for 
not doing what I should not know how to do myself. Ifallearthly 
power were given me, I should not know what to do as to the 
existing institution. My first impulse would possibly be to free 
all the slaves and send them to Liberia to their own native land. 
But a moment's reflection would convince me that this would 
not be best for them. If they were all landed thers in a day they 
would all perish in the next ten days, and there is not surplus 
money enough to carry them there in many times ten days. 
What then? Free them all and keep them among us as under- 
lings? Is it quite certain that this would alter their condition? 
Free them and make them politically and socially our equals? 
My own feelings will not admit of this, and if mine would, we 
well know that those of the great mass of whites will not. W^e 
cannot make them our equals. A system of gradual emancipa- 
tion might be adopted, and I will not undertake to judge our 
Southern friends for tardiness in this matter." 

The Republican leaders were very much afraid of having im- 
puted to them any desire to abolish slavery — especially was 
Lincoln afraid of this. He wrote Alexander Stephens before 
he was inaugurated that the slaves would be as safe under his 
administration as they were under that of George Washington. 
He told a friend in Kentucky that if he would vote for him every 
fugitive slave should be returned. At Peoria, 111., in 1854 he 
said, "I acknowledge the constitutional rights of the States — 
not grudgingly, but fairly and fully, and I will give them any 
legislation for reclaiming their fugitive slaves." 

The point the Republican Party wanted to stress was to 
oppose making slave States out of the newly acquired territory, 
not abolishing slavery as it then existed. Lincoln spoke of anti- 
slavery men in 1862 as "Radicals and Abolitionists." Rhodes 
said that the abolitionists said, "The President is not with us; 
he has no anti-slavery instincts." — (Rhodes' History of United 
States, Vol. IV., p. 64.) 

31 



Abraham Lincoln was elected by the Republican Party 
on a minority vote because of a split in the Democratic ranks. 
Three candidates divided* that vote. Lincoln knew that 
many leading men of the North were not with him, and he would 
have this to contend with from the first. 

Abraham Lincoln was very sensitive, and Lamon says, 
suffered greatly from attacks made upon him personally as 
well as those upon his administration. He relates the following 
incident illustrating this trait of his character. "I went one 
day to his office and found him lying on a sofa, greatly distressed. 
Jumping to his feet, he said, "Lamon, you know better than any 
living man that from my boyhood up my ambition has been to 
be President of the LInited States — but look at me! I wish I 
had never been born ! I would rather be dead than as President 
abused in the house of my friends." This was the time, says 
Lamon, when members of the Cabinet were referring to him as 
the "Baboon at the other end of the avenue," and the "idiot 
of the White House." To the men of his Cabinet this sensitive 
side of his nature was never shown — to them he always appeared 
indifferent to ridicule and abuse. 

Lamon, like Herndon, did not believe in falsifying even 
for a friend, and Boswell-like he told things as they were. It is 
from Lamon's pen that we have what really occurred after Lin- 
coln's death, and he it is who tells how men who had most vili- 
fied him in life began at once most to glorify him after death, 
and even to give to him the attributes of God. Quoting his 
words: "There was the fiercest rivalry as to who should canonize 
Mr. Lincoln in the most solemn words; who should compare 
him to the most sacred character in history. He was called 
prophet, priest, and king. He was said to be Washington, 
Moses, and even likened to Christ the Redeemer, and unto God 
Himself. After that came the ceremony of apotheosis: the 
deification took place with showy magnificence; men who had 
exhausted the resources of their skill and ingenuity in venomous 
detractions of the living Lincoln were the first after death to 
undertake the task of guarding his memory, not as a human 
being, but as God. Who were these men who had been his 
detractors in life? Salmon P. Chase, his Secretary of Treas- 
ury; Edwin Stanton, his Secretary of War; Hannibal Hamlin, 
the Vice-President; Seward, his Secretary of State; John C. 
Fremont, Charles Sumner, Trumbull, Ben. Wade, Henry 
Wilson, Thaddeus Stevens, Henry Ward Beecher, Wendell 
Phillips, Winter Davis. Chandler and Horace Greeley. With 

32 



the exception of Greeley, they now assumed a reverential atti- 
tude toward the dead man and tried to make the world believe 
that Lincoln had been their wise and trusted ruler, their guide, 
their head, their Moses who had led them out of the awful 
Wilderness of War." 

Herndon and Lamon both loved Lincoln but scouted and 
despised this deification "twaddle" which these detractors 
began to put in play even before Lincoln was cold in his grave. 

When Herndon's and Lamon's biographies had fast disap- 
peared, Jessie William Weik asked Herndon to aid him in pre- 
paring a larger and fuller "Life of Lincoln." Herndon con- 
sented, provided he would be allowed to write the preface. 
Weik did not wish to grant this request, but, under the circum- 
stances, he had to consent, hoping few would read a preface. 
Here it is: 

"With a view to throwing light on some attributes of Mr. 
Lincoln's character, heretofore obscure, these volumes are given 
to the world. The whole truth concerning Mr. Lincoln should 
be known. The truth will at last come out, and no man must 
hope to evade it. Some persons will doubtless object to the 
narration of certain facts which they contend should be assigned 
to the tomb. Their pretense is that no good can come from 
such ghastly exposures. My answer is, that these facts are in- 
dispensable to a full knowledge of Mr. Lincoln. We must have 
all the facts concerning him. We must be prepared to take Mr. 
Lincoln as he was. He rose from a lower depth than any other 
great man did— from a stagnant, putrid pool. I should be re- 
miss in my duty if I did not throw light on this part of the pic- 
ture. Mr. Lincoln was my warm and devoted friend. I always 
loved him. I revere his name today. My purpose to tell the 
truth about him need occasion no apprehension. God's naked 
truth cannot injure any man's fame. The world should be told 
what the skeleton was with Lincoln, what cancer he had inside." 

Lamon and Herndon were greatly distressed at the con- 
tinued falsehoods told regarding Lincoln's hatred for slavery 
and his piety. Herndon says, "Lincoln was in no sense religi- 
ous. In 1854 he made me erase the name of God from a speech 
I was about to make. He did this also to one of his friends in 
Washington City. I know when he left Springfield for Wash- 
ington he had undergone no change in his opinion on religion." 
Nicolay says the same thing Lamon says, "After Mr. Lincoln 
became President, while he never changed his views of the 
Christian religion, he did become more discreet in talking against 

33 



it." Again, "He did study his Bible, he did sometimes go to 
church, and he did quote Scripture but it was to confound not 
to convert." Herndon says, "To the day of his death Mr. 
Lincoln denied the inspiration of the Scriptures and the Divinity 
of Jesus Christ, and he never connected himself with any religi- 
ous denomination. He was not pious in any sense of the word." 

It is, however, a very serious matter to enter into condemna- 
tion of any man in his relation to his Maker, and this is a matter 
which should be left for him and his God to settle — but is it right 
that a man who made no profession of religion in life should be 
held up for emulation to the Christian children of this generation? 
Is it right that ministers of the Gospel, Christian public speakers 
and teachers should place Abraham Lincoln as "our greatest 
American"? Shall our children be taught that great Americans 
need not love God, need not believe the Divinity of our Lord 
and in the inspiration of His Holy Word, and need not acknowl- 
edge Him before men? 

Now the question arises wherein shall Abraham Lincoln 
be held up as an exemplar for the imitation of our American 
Youth? We cannot hold him up as a GENTLEMAN OF RE- 
FINEMENT AND CULTURE. Herndon says: "Lincoln's 
highest delight was to be in the midst of rowdy men engaged in a 
fist fight while the crowd betted on the result, and money, 
whiskey and tobacco were at stake." 

Herndon and Lamon both say: "Lincoln was extremely 
fond of horse races and cock lights, and had a passion to spin 
yarns on street corners or in dram shops to a crowd of boys. 
These yarns Lincoln would tell even in the presence of preachers." 
Even Holland, one of his glorifiers, admits that "Lincoln's vulgar 
stories are too indecent to be printed," and some of these stories 
were told after he entered the White House. Lamon says: 
"Lincoln did not like strong drink, but he drank his dram with 
others for fear of giving offense. ABE WAS ALWAYS FOR 
DOING WHAT THE PEOPLE DID." He must have been 
lacking in true refinement of feeling, or he would never have stood 
for Ben Butler's insult to those women in New Orleans. 

We cannot commend Lincoln for integrity of character. 
It is true Abraham Lincoln could not be bribed, nor was he 
ever guilty of graft. Herndon calls him "Honest Abe Lincoln," 
and he was, but he was not above bribing others. When 
McClellan was running against him for President, Lincoln 
used his ofilice as Commander-in-Chief of the army to defeat 
McClellan by ordering furloughs to be given to 5,000 soldiers 

34 



in order that at the polls they might carry Pennsylvania for him 
in the election. — {A. K. McChire — Our Presidents and How We 
Make Them. p. 195.) 

We cannot hold him up as humane or tender hearted. Had 
he been he would not have allowed Sheridan's cruelty in the 
Shenandoah Valley; Sherman's cruelty in his "March to the 
Sea;" nor would he have denied medicine, vessels, or exchange 
to those poor suffering, dying men in Andersonville Prison. 
By a word he could have prevented all. President Davis urged 
him to do ths latter, General Howell Cobb urged it, Capt. 
Wirz urged him to do it — the surgeons and prisoners themselves 
urged him to do it. 

Had he been humane, he would not have allowed 38,000 
men and women — editors, politicians, clergymen of good charac- 
ter and honor — imprisoned in gloomy, damp casements, for 
no overt act, but simply because they were "Democrat suspects." 
— {Life and Times oj Hannibal Hamlin, p. 393.) {Bancroft'' s Life 
of Seward, Vol. 2, p. 254.) 

His Emancipation Proclamation was not issued from a 
humane standpoint. He hoped it would incite the negroes to 
rise against the women and children. — {Rhodes History of 
United States, Vol. IV., p. 344.) 

One may say the spirit of that Gettysburg address should be 
emulated. Lamon says that "is not the speech Mr. Lincoln 
made at Gettysburg." Nicolay says "it was revised." Lamon 
says all that his biographers say of "Mr. Everett's commendatory 
words is bosh." Mr. Everett was disappointed in the speech 
and so was Mr. Seward. 

We cannot hold him up as a hater of slavery. Abraham 
Lincoln did not free the slaves because he hated slavery, nor for 
any love for the African race, nor for any desire to give them 
suffrage or social equality. In his campaign speeches, he said 
he had no thought of freeing the slaves. In his Inaugural Address 
he said the same. He made Hunter and Fremont countermand 
their acts freeing the slaves in conquered territory in the early 
years of the War, saying "they could not by the Constitution do 
it," and "the war was not being fought with any view of freeing 
the slaves." His Emancipation Proclamation was intended 
only as a punishment for the seceding States. It was with no 
thought of freeing the slaves of the more than 300,000 slave- 
holders then in the Northern army. 

His Emancipation Proclamation was issued for a fourfold 

35 



purpose and it was issued with fear and trepidation lest he should 
offend his Northern constituents. He did it: 

FIRST:— 

Because of an oath — that if Lee should be 
driven from Maryland he would free the slaves 
{Barnes and Guerber.) 

SECOND:— 

The time of enlistment had expired for many 
men in the army and he hoped this would encourage 
reinlistment. 

THIRD:— 

Trusting that Southern men would be forced 
to return home to protect their wives and children 
from negro insurrection. 

FOURTH:— 

To prevent foreign nations from recognizing 
the Confederacy. 

Was he satisfied with its effect? Let us see what happened. 
"Many and many a man deserted in the winter of 1862-63 be- 
cause of Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation. The soldiers 
did not believe that Lincoln had the right to issue it. They re- 
fused to fight." — {McClures Magazine Jan. 1893, p. 165. — also 
Tarhell.) Wendell Phillips said Lincoln acknowledged 
that "the Emancipation Proclamation was the greatest folly of 
his life." "There were great losses in the elections in conse- 
quence of the Emancipation Proclamation. — {Nicolay &' Hay, 
Vol. II. p. 261.) "While I hope something from this proclama- 
tion, my expectations are not so sanguine as are those of some 
friends. The time for its effect Southward has not come; but 
Northward the effect should be instantaneous. It is six days 
old and while commendation in newspapers and by distinguished 
individuals is all that a vain man could wish, the stocks have 
declined and troops come forward more slowly than ever. This 
looked squarely in the face is not very satisfactory. We have 
fewer troops in the field at the end of six days than we had at 
the beginning — the attrition among the old, outnumbering the 
addition by the new. The North responds to the proclamation 
sufficiently IN BREATH; but breath alone kills no rebels. I 
wish I, could write more cheerfully." — {Extract from letter, Sept. 
28, 1863, from Abraham Lincoln to Hannibal Hamlin.) 

36 



There was not an instance of insurrection among the negroes 
of the South. It was not necessary for one Southern soldier 
to return to his home on this account. 

The only good result to the North was it did prevent 
foreign nations from recognizing the Southern Confederacy. 

Can he be held up as an example of what a man can do born 
under the most adverse circumstances? Yes, Lincoln rose in a 
marvellous way above poverty and adverse surroundings to the 
highest position in the Nation's gift — but because Lincoln was 
a self-made man he should not be held up as "The Typical 
American." The term is misleading. If by typical is a 
high type of his kind — then it is all right. He was a fine type 
of a self-made man and all should honor him for what he did 
with his opportunities — but this need not place him on a pin- 
nacle of glory that makes him pre-eminent over such men as 
George Washington, Jefferson Davis, Robert E. Lee and a host 
of others North and South deserving far more praise. 

We can extol Lincoln as a brave man physically and an 
athlete, as it were. "A gang of negroes came on board of a flat 
boat, he was taking with a cargo to New Orleans, to rob the boat, 
but Abe Lincoln had no fear. He picked up a club and the ne- 
groes bruised and bleeding were glad to get off with their lives." 

"While clerking in a grocery store at New Salem a bully 
named Jack Armstrong, belonging to a gang of ruffians, used to 
test every stranger that came amongst them. He tried Abe, 
but soon found his match and left him unmolested." When in 
the White House a man came to demand what Lincoln had be- 
fore refused. Upon leaving hs said, "A man need not expect 
justice from the White House." Lincoln took him by the collar 
and led him to the door and ordered him to go and never to 
return, saying, "I can stand abuse but not insult." 

His physical strength was beyond the ordinary. It is said 
when quite a young man he could lift a barrel of cider and drink 
from the bunghole. 

Wherein was Lincoln weak? Lincoln had it in his power 
to make peace four times and refused to do it. The Crittenden 
Resolutions were a most generous proposition from the South to 
allow out of the 1,200,000 square miles of territory acquired by 
conquest and purchase, 900,000 square miles for free territory 
and the remaining 300,000 square miles to be free or slave as 
each new State formed might choose, and this, too, when South- 
ern prowess had largely gained the territory. These resolutions 
in the interest of peace were offered by Northern and Southern 

37 



Democrats. Lincoln notified all Republican States through 
Sertators Harlan and Zach Chandler to vote against these reso- 
lutions. Had he not done this they would have passed. Un- 
just as they were to the South, the South would have accepted 
them, and Thurlow Weed and Seward would have seen that they 
were passed by the North. It was Lincoln's fault they were 
rejected. 

A peace convention was called at Washington City of dele- 
gates from the non-seceding Southern States. Lincoln assured 
them there would be no trouble at Fort Sumter. They returned 
to their homes. On the same train by which they left Wash- 
ington was hifr "Call to Arms." Peace could have been made 
but was not. 

Again, Peace Commissioners were sent from the Con- 
federate government to Washington to ask for the peaceful 
surrender of Fort Sumter. THE SOUTH DID NOT WANT 
WAR. On the 12th of March, 1861, the following note addressed 
to Mr. Seward, Secretary of State, was sent by the three Com- 
missioners from the Confederate States. 

"The undersigned are instructed to make to the Govern- 
ment of the United States overtures for the opening of negotia- 
tions, assuring the Government of the United States that the 
President, Congress, and people of the Confederate States 
earnestly desire A PEACEFUL SOLUTION OF THESE 
GREAT QUESTIONS: that it is neither their interest nor their 
wish to make any demand which is not founded in strictest 
justice, nor do any act to injure their late Confederates." A 
peaceful spirit would have kept peace — who was responsible for 
the answer? 

Lincoln could have granted this request and peace would 
have followed. The method he took forced war. He de- 
termined, contrary to the Constitution, to coerce the States 
back into the Union. He knew he could not call for an armed 
force without resentment from the North and a violation of the 
compact. He must have an excuse, and that excuse was to 
force Fort Sumter to be fired upon. 

Lincoln was a shrewd politician. He would not openly 
meet the peace commissioners. He sent Seward. Seward, 
an equally shrewd mediator, would not meet the peace commis- 
sioners — he sent Judge Campbell to carry the messages so worded 
as to cause delay while giving hope of success. During this 
delay the vessels for arming, and provisioning the fort were 
fitted out and sailed. Fort Sumter was fired on, the excuse for 

38 



war was given, the call to arms that Lincoln wished was made 
and made without consulting his Cabinet. It was Lincoln and 
Seward and Blair who forced war. 

Again, at Hampton Roads Conference, Lincoln had an op- 
portunity to make peace, but no terms that could be accepted 
were offered and he knew it, because he saw that surrender 
would soon be inevitable. Every man lost after this on either 
side, Lincoln was responsible for. Henry Watterson to vilify 
Davis in order to glorify Lincoln says Lincoln did offer terms of 
peace that could have been accepted, but Lincoln himself never 
said so, nor did the commissioners in their report to President 
Davis and his Cabinet say so. 

Lincoln never hesitated to violate the Constitution when he 
so desired. The Chief Justice testified to this. Lincoln sus- 
pended the writ of Habeas Corpus in 1861; he allowed West 
Virginia to be formed from Virginia contrary to the Constitu- 
tion; he issued his Emancipation Proclamation without consult- 
ing his Cabinet and in violation of the Constitution. 

He consented to a cartel for exchange of prisoners Feb. 14, 
1862. When it was to the advantage of the North, faith was 
kept; when it was to the advantage of the South, it was violated. 
— {See Cor. Lieut.-Col. Ludloiv and Col. Ould, July 26, 1863.) 

Lincoln, to carry out his point, sacrificed the lives of 
1,000,000 men, 800,000 wore the blue, 200,000, the gray, and 
$10,000,000,000 of the United States' money, and allowed 
more than one billion of the South's property to be confiscated 
or destroyed. 

In what respect was Lincoln strong? 

He had a shrewdness and cunning that was unparalleled 
and which enabled him to master and thwart some of the keenest 
intellects in the political life of the day. He managed Stanton, 
Sumner, Chase, Ben Wade, Thad Stevens and Seward in a most 
marvellous manner. He met their attacks with smiling indif- 
ference which angered them and made them all the more re- 
sentful. He went quietly on and had his own way. When he 
feared their opposition, he did not ask their advice, but, as a 
dictator, he violated the Constitution when he pleased to carry 
any point. He bore with marvellous fortitude and silence the 
unhappy relation in his home. None but his most intimate 
friends, Lamon, Herndon, Nicolay and Hay, ever dreamed of 
much that he bore in heroic silence. His tenderness to his chil- 
dren was always very beautiful. There is not an instance of 
harshness recorded that was shown to any one of them. To Tad, 

39 



the afflicted boy, he was especially tender — often holding him on 
his knee during State interviews. He was always kind to little 
children. 

He realized that he would be obliged to free all slaves by 
war, so he planned a bill to introduce into Congress to pay 
$400,000,000 for slaves belonging to the slaveholders of the 
North. He realized how his act of coercion which brought on the 
War and his freeing of the slaves, and destruction and confisca- 
tion of the life and property of the Southern States had been 
caused by the acts of War, so his policy for Reconstruction was 
made as magnanimous as he dared or could be expected. 

He had a way of illustrating by anecdote what his wishes 
were and thus not openly committing himself to anything that 
could poHtically be brought against him. 

By an anecdote he let Grant know that his terms of surrender 
for Lee must be magnanimous. By an anecdote he showed 
very plainly he desired President Davis to escape and not fall 
into the hands of the North. He knew Davis could never be 
tried for treason, therefore, he did not wish the test made. Had 
he lived, Sherman's terms of surrender to Johnston would not 
have been so severely dealt with by the Cabinet, for those were 
the very terms Lincoln would have wished. 

His death was the greatest blow that could have befallen 
the South. Jefferson Davis said this, Howell Cobb and other 
Southern statesmen said this. No statesman. North or South, 
rejoiced over the news of his death except Thad Stevens who 
desired to carry out his own Reconstruction policy instead of 
Lincoln's. 

"Lincoln died in the hour of victory. He had attained to 
the loftiest pinnacle of success and he died at his zenith." George 
R. Wendling said of him: "Elected by a minority vote, unknown 
to all party leaders, no executive experience, no treasury, Con- 
gress full of factions, Seward playing for control. Chase intriguing, 
Stanton arrogant, Cameron dishonest, foreign nations unsympa- 
thetic, and the public discouraged — yet in the face of all this 
and with the passions of all men inflamed to the highest pitch, 
Lincoln, with clear vision and serene temper, never faltered." 

Abraham Lincoln was an enigma — a man in many ways 
different from other men. He was original to the point of ec- 
centricity. Of Southern origin he was reared away from 
the South. Of Southern inheritance his environment was the 
Western prairie, and his habits were habits of Western life. 

40 



An untrammeled child of nature, he was a rare product of rural 
energy. 

He was simple* he was wise; he was gentle, he was firm; 
he was frank, he was astute; he was melancholy, he was full of 
mirth ; he was patient, he was restless ; he was a meek husband ; 
a lenient father; he was weak, he was strong; he hated the slave, 
he freed the slave; he was tactful but without tact; a curious 
contradiction, a bundle of paradoxes. He was a true repre- 
sentative of the plebeian class. He studied men more than 
he studied books. He knew their strong points, and their weak 
points; he knew their faults, their foibles, their whims and their 
caprices. 

He had few friends and fewer intimates. He unbosomed 
himself to none. He responded quickly to distress. He was 
physically and morally brave. His will was immovable yet he 
was the child of policy and expediency. He was ambitious and 
aspiring. He was self confident and never hesitated to cross 
mental swords with the most brilliant. 

His real strength lay in knowing plain people for he was one 
of them, and there are more plain people in the world than any 
other kind. He saw their struggle and toil, their griefs and tears. 
He knew how they thought and felt and acted. He was their 
friend and they knew it. He knew how to communicate with 
them in their speech and amuse them by his jokes. He was an 
x'\merican, but an American of a new national type. 

Jefferson Davis was not only at home with the aristocrat, 
but with the lowly and the negro. He knew how to adapt 
himself to all classes of people — but Lincoln could better meet 
the plebeian than Davis could, because he was one of them. 
He was never at home with the aristocrats, and was awkward 
in their presence. Neither in dress, in manner nor in social 
intercourse, was he at ease — he was arkward and ungainly in 
appearance. The members of the Cabinet were ashamed of his 
careless dress and felt that the dignity of his position warranted 
greater care and thought, and they said so, but Lincoln cared 
not for any criticisms along this line. He had never given 
thought to this personal appearance and he did not notice their 
jests about him, nor did he seem to care for the caricatures in 
Punch. 

There has never been any character in history about whom 
such conflicting opinions prevail, and this undoubtedly is the 
result of his "speedy taking off." His biographers say: 

"He was very ambitious." — "He was without a particle of 
ambition." 41 



"He was ths saddest man." — "He was the jolliest man." 

"He was very religious." — "He was not religious at all." 

"He was a sincere Christian." — "He was far from being a 
Christian." 

"He was the most cunning man in America." — "He had 
not a particle of cunning in him." 

"He had the strongest personal attachments." — "He had 
no personal attachments at all." 

"He was a man with indomitable will." — "He was a man 
without a will." 

"He was a perfect tyrant."— "He was the softest-hearted 
man in the world." 

"He was remarkable for his pure-mindedness." — "He was 
known for his coarse and vulgar jests." 

"He was the wittiest of men." — "He retailed only the wit 
of other men." 

"He was candor itself." — "His candor and frankness was 
always assumed." 

"He was a gentleman by instinct." — "He was a perfect 
boor." 

"He was cool and impassive." — "He was susceptible to 
the strongest passions." 

"At tha bar he was a genius." — "As a lawyer he was a 
cunning clown." 

"He was a man without duplicity." — "His duplicity is 
without a parallel." — "His duplicity brought on the War." 

"The relation between Lincoln and his wife a model for 
married people." — "The relation between him and Mrs. Lin- 
coln notoriously unpleasant." 

"Abraham Lincoln did not believe in secession." Abraham 
Lincoln on the floor of Congress Jan. 13, 1848, said: "Any 
people anywhere, being inclined, and having the power, have the 
right to rise up and shake off the existing government and to 
form one that suits them better." 

Gen. Donn Piatt, who stumped the State of Illinois for 
Lincoln in his Presidential campaign, said, "I read of Lincoln 
today in eulogies and biographies, but I fail to recognize the man 
I knew in life." — {Men Who Saved the Union, p. 28.) 

What shall be believed? 

Shall the evidence after it is weighed be taken that he was 
a man of "ineffable purity, piety, and patriotism," and his 
cause "the cause of humanity, patriotism and righteousness?" 
and Jefferson Davis, "an arch traitor and felon," and his cause 

42 



"treason, rebellion and inhumanity?" The evidence of history 
is far from proving this to be the truth. 

Mr. Lincoln in all fairness must be judged by the truth of 
history alone as recorded by the men of the North — those 
who placed him in power. The evidence is very strong against 
him as A VIOLATOR OF THE CONSTITUTION: Wendell 
Phillips at the Cooper Institute, 1864, said: 

"I judge Mr. Lincoln by his acts, his violations of the law, 
his overthrow of liberty in the Northern States. 

"I judge Mr. Lincoln by his words, his deeds, and so judg- 
ing him, I am unwilling to trust Abraham Lincoln with the future 
of this country." 

Percy Gregg said, "Lincoln's order that Confederate com- 
missions or letters of marque granted to private or public ships 
should be disregarded and their crews treated as pirates, and 
all medicines declared contraband of war, violated every rule 
of civilized war and outraged the conscience of Christendom." 

April 4, 1861, Seward writes to Russell, the correspondent 
of the London Times: 

"It would be contrary to the spirit of the American Govern- 
ment to use armed force to subjugate the South." 

Again, April 10th to Charles Francis Adams, Sr., the Min- 
ister to England : 

"Only a despotic and imperial government can coerce 
seceding States." And yet this is what Mr. Lincoln did. "James 
Buchanan in his Message to Congress announced that there was 
no Constitutional warrant to coerce the seceding States.": — 
{John T. Morse — American Statesman Series.) 

If "the will of the people shall rule" be one of the funda- 
damental principles of the Constitution, why should Lincoln 
be glorified for making war on the South in opposition to the will 
of the people? Blair was the only member of the Cabinet who 
encouraged him to force the firing on Fort Sumter; every one 
of the others to whom the matter was suggested saw and said 
it would bring on war. 

McCIure, his friend, said, "Mr. Lincoln swore to obey the 
Constitution, but in eighteen months violated it by his Emanci- 
pation Proclamation." 

Mr. Rhodes— Vol. IV., p. 213, says: 

"There was no authority for the Proclamation by the Con- 
stitution and laws — nor was there any statute that warranted 
it." 

Chief Justice Chase said: 

43 



"Neither President, nor Congress, nor courts, possess any 
power not given by the Constitution." 

Godwin of The Nation says: 

"The first real breach in the Constitution was President 
Lincoln's using his war power to abolish slavery." 

Thad Stevens, "I will not stultify myself by supposing 
that Mr. Lincoln has any warrant in the Constitution for dis- 
membering Virginia." 

What shall be said of Lincoln's violations of the rules of 
civilized warfare? It was the duty of Mr. Lincoln, as Com- 
mander-in-chief of the army, to conduct the war on principles 
ADOPTED AND ENFORCED BY CIVILIZED NATIONS. 
"Private property could be seized only by military necessity 
for the support and benefit of the army." General McClellan 
and General George Thomas understood this and enforced it — 
Generals Sherman, Grant, Pope, Butler, Sheridan and others 
understood it, too, but DID NOT ENFORCE IT, and felt that 
they had the sanction of the official head. General Sherman's 
official report: 

"I estimate the damage to Georgia at $100,000,000 — at 
least $20,000,000 inured to our benefit, THE REMAINDER 
WAS SIMPLY WASTE AND DESTRUCTION." Lincoln 
uttered no protest. 

General Grant to General Davis Hunter, Aug. 5, 1864: 
"Take all provisions, forage and stock wanted for use of your 
command; SUCH AS CANNOT BE CONSUMED, DESTROY. 
Lincoln said not a word. 

Sheridan said: 

"I HAVE DESTROYED over 2,000 barns filled with wheat 
and hay and farming utensils; over seventy mills filled with 
flour and wheat, etc." Lincoln uttered no protest. 

Judge Jeremiah S. Black of Pennsylvania said : 

"Of the wanton cruelties that Lincoln's administration has 
inflicted upon unoffending citizens, I have neither space nor skill, 
nor time, to paint them — since the fall of Robespierre, nothing 
has occurred to cast such disrepute on Republican institutions." 
— {Black's Essays, p. 153.) 

Charles A. Dana, Assistant Secretary of War, in speaking 
of Anderson ville, says: 

"The evidence must be taken as conclusive: It proves 
that it was not the Confederate authorities who insisted on 
keeping our prisoners in distress, want and disease, BUT THE 
COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF OF OUR ARMY." 

44 



That the United States is today a Nation not a Republic 
of Sovereign States is due, without doubt, to Lincoln's policy 
of coercion, backed by over-whelming forces and resources and 
with the world on his side. Did it require such an unusual 
genius to succeed under these circumstances? 

Had the South won in the conflict, Jefferson Davis would 
have been the wonder of the world, for it would have been said, 
with an army of 600,000 he put to flight an army of 2,800,000; 
with no trained military, no navy, little ammunition, few fac- 
tories, ports blockaded, he conquered the North who had every 
resource at her command, and the whole world in sympathy, if 
not in co-operation, with her. It truly would have been a mira- 
cle. To have held out four years against such odds was wonder- 
ful, as it was. 

Had the South won, the Constitution need not to have 
been changed. The Republic would have remained. The 
RIGHT OF A STATE TO SECEDE would have remained, 
but the expediency of seceding again might have been questioned. 
The slaves would not have been freed in a body, BUT THAT 
THEY WOULD HAVE BEEN FREED BY GRADUAL 
EMANCIPATION there is not a shadow of doubt. 

Had the South won, the Government would have been in 
the hands of men of statecraft at the South — men so far superior 
in their sense of right and justice to such men as Thad Stevens, 
Chas. Sumner, Edwin Stanton, Andrew Johnson, William 
Seward, Ben Wade, and others of that stamp who held the reins 
of government in Andrew Johnson's administration and brought 
Reconstruction upon the South. This engendered race problems 
which have taken more than fifty years to adjust. 

Jefferson Davis would doubtless have been put at the head 
of the United States army, a position he always craved, and 
Robert E. Lee would have been another Washington to have 
led us into a stronger Union than ever existed. 

The South was the citadel of conservatism. Had she pre- 
vailed, no dangers from imperiahsm and centralization would 
have beset us. The South was NEVER AN INVADER OF 
RIGHTS BUT ALWAYS A DEFENDER OF RIGHTS. 

One may say the South would never have come to a knowl- 
edge of her own possibilities had not the slaves been freed as they 
were. The War Between the States did teach the South a les- 
son of unpreparedness by which she discovered her weaknesses 
and her possibilities. That War taught her that the slaveholders 
were in bondage far greater than the slaves. Had the slaves 

45 



been freed by gradual emancipation, there would probably 
have been no race problems today — everything would have been 
adjusted and adjusted in the most amicable way long before 
fifty years had passed. 

The very fact that today the Confederate soldier wears the 
Cross of Honor; to the Confederate soldier, more monuments 
have been erected than to any other soldier of any other war; 
that to Confederate valor, THE GREATEST MONUMENT 
IN THE WORLD is soon to be erected, proves the cause for 
which the South fought is anything but a "Lost Cause." What 
the North achieved by overwhelming odds was not such a won- 
derful victory, and Abraham Lincoln, because he was at the helm 
of Government at that time, did not perform such a marvellous 
deed, and therefore should not be glorified. 

It is queer that a Southern born man and a Confederate 
soldier should be Lincoln's greatest glorifier. Henry Watterson, 
undoubtedly posted by James Breckenridge Speed, Lincoln's 
friend, who asked him to present the statue of Lincoln to Ken- 
tucky, said among other things, "Your lowly cabin which is 
to be dedicated on the morrow may well be likened to the Manger 
of Bethlehem, the boy that went thence to a God-like destiny, 
to the Son of God, the Father Almighty of Him and us all. 
Whence his prompting except from God? His tragic death may 
be likened also to that other martyr whom Lincoln so closely 
resembled. 

"There are utterances of his which read like rescripts from the 
Sermon on the Mount. Reviled as Him of Galilee, slain, even 
as Him of Galilee, yet as gentle and as unoffending, a man who 
died for men." 

This seemed sacrilege to those who knew Lincoln as he 
really was, and what had gone before in Colonel Watterson's 
speech lost its power. 

The log cabin where Lincoln was born was presented to the 
U. S. government Sept. 4, 1916, and a great memorial to him is 
being erected in Washington City. 

WHY DID JOHN WILKES BOOTH ASSASSINATE 
LINCOLN? 

President Davis was accused of instigating the assassina- 
tion of Abraham Lincoln, and it was said his imprisonment and 
the placing of manacles upon him was based on this accusation. 
When proof could not be obtained, then an attempt was made to 
bribe Capt. Wirz to implicate him in the cruel treatment of the 

46 



Andersonville prisoners. This Capt. Wirz denied most positive- 
ly even with offer of pardon. 

President Davis grieved over Lincoln's assassination, say- 
ing, "It is the greatest blow that could befall the South." Why 
then was Lincoln assassinated by John Wilkes Booth? Surely 
not because Booth was such an ardent lover of the Confederacy, 
for had he been HE WOULD HAVE BEEN IN THE RANKS 
FIGHTING — and not on the stage acting. There was some 
other motive that caused Booth to plot to kill Lincoln and Lewis 
Payne, his accomplice, plan to kill Seward. 

Captain John James Thompson, of Gainesville, Fla., knew 
John Wilkes Booth, Lewis Payne and John Yates Beall. He 
testified before his death that it was because Lincoln had prom- 
ised to pardon Beall and then refused to do it when it was in his 
power to do it^because of his rejection of all testimony in Beall's 
favor, and because Seward was the one who had prevailed upon 
Lincoln not to act in the matter, that they determined to carry 
out this plot. 

There was a story prevailing — whether true or not is not 
known^ — that Gen. Grant was to have been in the theatre box 
with Lincoln that night, and some friend arranged to have him 
called out of the city on business. The assassins had no grudge 
against Gen. Grant. 

Capt. Thompson had intended giving affidavit of all this, 
but died before doing it. When the account appeared in the 
Confederate Veteran, written by Gen. John Tench of Florida, 
a gentleman in Mississippi wrote saying he could vouch for the 
truth of all that he had said. Gen. Tench has this letter. The 
family of Beall deny any connection with Booth in this matter, 
saying John Wilkes Booth did not personally know John Yates 
Beall; but those who were in Washington City during the trial 
testify to Booth's, McClure's, Payne's and other friends' indigna- 
tion over the injustice done John Yates Beall, and believe Lin- 
coln's death resulted from it. John Wilkes Booth was an inti- 
mate friend of Lincoln's and the story goes that McClure got 
Booth to extract a promise from Lincoln regarding Beall, and 
Lincoln, advised by Seward and fearing to interfere with Gen. 
Dix's order, failed to keep his promise. 

WHAT BECAME OF JOHN WILKES BOOTH? 

The following is an extract from a letter from General James 
Gordon, of Mississippi, to Miss Mildred Rutherford, of Athens, 
Ga. 

47 



"Oklahoma, Aug. 11, 1894. 
'Dear Miss Rutherford: 

"I have puzzled my brain considerably over your Plus Questions ia 
your American Authors, and will answer one you cannot answer yourself: 
Page 565 — What was the Fate of John Wilkes Booth? 

"In 1864 I escaped from my captors and not being able to reach home 
sought refuge in Canada. In Montreal at Queen's Hotel, I think it was, I 
met Wilkes Booth, who was a a star actor at that time. He was a very hand- 
some man, and quite an intelligent and agreeable companion. And as he 
sympathized wi,th the South in her struggle, we became intimate friend:- in a 
brief acquaintance. When he left for Washinj^^ton, I bade him good-bye vvich 
many kind wishes, little thinking that I grasped the hand in friendly farewell 
that would soon be stained with the blood of an assassinated President. 
Nor do I think he had such thought at that time. In a few clays, I was shocked 
at the report of Lincoln's death by the hand of John \\ ilkes Booth ! 

"Five years after that I visited Memphis, and there met a friend who was 
also an intimate friend of Booth's. He showed me a, letter from a mutual 
friend, who had been absent since the close of the war, who was thei. in ;he 
Rocky Mountains hunting and trapping. He said in his letter t.,at hi.s 
companion and friend could not send his name, for he bore a DEAD NAME, 
yet sent him his photograph to let him know that the original was still alive, 
and sent his kindly remembrances to him and myself. This photo was a 
true likeness of John Wilkes Booth. 

"I then remembered that no one who had ever seen Booth was permitted 
to see the body of the dead man that had been killed, and a reward claimed 
for the capture, dead or alive, of the assassin. Booth. That no coroner's in- 
quest had been permitted to sit on his body. That everything pertaining to 
his remains were secret, even the spot where buried was unknown to the world. 
Since that time I have frequently seen vague rumors of some one thinking 
they recognized John Wilkes Booth in various parts of the world — once in 
Mexico, again in Havana — then in several European cities. Yet no one gave 
any credence to it. 

"It is my opinion that Booth was not the man killed by Corbett, and may 
be alive yet. You may take this for what it is worth, yet I think I will be the 
only reader of your splendid work that will answer this question correctly. 
: "I am sincerely yours. 

"JAMES GORDON." 

This original letter is in the Histerical Records, prepared 
by Miss Rutherford, Historian General U. D. C, and is to be 
placed in the Confederate Museum in Richmond, Va. 

Summed up, the services of Lincoln to the United States government 
were: 

Captain in the Black Hawk War. He attained no distinction. 

One term in the House of Representatives, 1846. No service of note 
rendered. Failed to be elected to the Senate. 

Elected President of the United States by the Republican Party on a 
minority vote. 

Re-elected President in 1865, over McClellan, by using his power as 
commander-in-chief of the army. 

He involved the United States in war by reenforcing Fort Sumter. 

He prevented the "Trent" affair from involving the United States in war 
with England. 

He refused to aid Mexico against Maximilian in 1863, and kept the 
United States out of war. 

He freed the slaves of the Southern States by a proclamation that was 
unconstitutional. 

He preserved the Union, not by a constitutional right, but by armed 
might. 



VIRGINIA STATIONERY CO., PRINTERS, RICHMOND 

48 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



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